


The Children's Crusade

by NathanWhoWritesSometimes



Category: Original Work
Genre: Fantasy, Work In Progress
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-10
Updated: 2020-08-11
Packaged: 2021-03-06 01:00:02
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 4
Words: 16,664
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25824760
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/NathanWhoWritesSometimes/pseuds/NathanWhoWritesSometimes
Summary: A young boy wakes up in a forest with no knowledge of how he came there. The long fight for survival that awaits will change him forever.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you for reading! This is a work in progress so if you have any ideas on how to improve the story, or where you would like to see it go next, please leave a comment!

Stars glistened through the firmament, wayward apostles reaching in vain toward their charge, the moon. But there was no man in the moon, its white shell empty, and in the darkness behind the stars there was nothing.

A freeze swept across the boy's face. His nose was already numb. He must have forgotten to close the window. His right hand reached across to close it and fell through the air, finding neither pane nor sill, landing gently in the frozen softness. He watched the snow shuffle about, covering his dark fingers in their whiteness. Sleepy eyes looked about, finding no walls about him and no bed beneath.

The boy was on his feet in a moment, blood drumming in his skull. A sterile light shattered in all directions about him, sundered by the frail limbs of trees. These limbs hung heavy with the weight of snowfall, glimmering in the moonlight, cascading an infinite web between him and the sky. A maze of frosted trunks stretched on in every direction. The snow glided like fallen stars, twinkling through the air to vanish in the white flood at his feet.

The breeze struck his back, needles piercing his flesh, goosebumps flowing up from his arms. He staggered with bare, red toes to the nearest tree and took shelter behind it. A yellow t-shirt clung wet to his torso, boxers gripped his thighs. His mother's crucifix hung limp from his neck. He hugged his chest tightly, leaning around the tree to see where he had lain. Once the plume of white breath drifted from his eyes he found the stiff imprint of his body in the snow, like an angel without wings. His own footprints wandered without confidence to the spot where he stood and roamed off into the forest.

His brow furrowed. He looked closer. From his very spot, footprints lead into the darkness off to the right. They were prints of bare feet. Lifting his right leg, he carefully placed it in the nearest track. It fit perfectly.

He shot back against the tree, eyes wide before him. No sound had called, no movement seen, but something within him cried terror. Before him was a white hill, rising above him like a wave about to crash down upon him. Trees rose from the wave, their creaking limps scattered across its face. Then he noticed two branches unlike the rest, symmetrical, uniform, flowing in either direction with many tines that shot up toward the sky. Below the branches were two obsidian pools, quivering light dancing over their depths.

As soon as he realized what he was looking at the white stag reared back and thundered off to the left through the trees and into obscurity. He lurched to follow, then resisted. He had to think, had to plan. If he didn’t find shelter soon, he would die. He closed his eyes tight. Breathing steadily, trying to slow his pounding heart. Sliding to the ground, forcing ideas into his mind. It was unlikely that the stag would lead him to civilization. The footprints leading in the opposite direction might not either. They might only lead to someone as lost and afraid as he was...but they would lead to someone.

He stood and trudged through the white flood, following this invisible guide. Toward the wave and across it, down gullies and around thickets he loyally trekked, though his guide seemed to have no better idea of where to go than he did. Where was he? There was no area of trees this large within twenty miles of his home. The further he trekked, the longer this distance became. Thirty miles. Fifty. There was no guessing where he might be. Wherever this was, it must be very far north. He had never seen this amount of snow in September. How did he get here? Was he kidnapped? What kidnapper would take someone from their home, drive them hundreds of miles and leave them in the middle of the woods? Maybe his kidnappers wanted to hunt him for some kind of bloodsport. He wouldn’t be very challenging game if he froze to death. 

Atop a small hill he looked out to the path laid before him, lit by the moon at his back. His invisible guide drove boundlessly through the forest. Didn’t they know when you’re lost in the forest you’re supposed to stay put? They probably were as afraid of dying as he was. If they just stopped they could figure this out together. He couldn’t judge them. At least he had the tracks. They woke up all alone with no signs of help. Or did they? These footprints were perfect, the snow hadn’t filled them in at all. If the tracks were that fresh, his guide must have been at the tree just before he woke up. How could they not have seen him? Was he following someone who didn’t want to be found?

He crouched to look at the tracks again, then looked back. The image startled him. Wiping the wet from his eyes, scraping the frost from his lashes he looked again, but what he saw had not changed. There was only one set of tracks in the snow behind him. He thought of the likelihood that he had walked in the exact prints of his invisible guide, then moved on. 

Each hill floated by like fog on the lake, the world shrinking to this very spot and making a moment an eternity, then vanishing without memory. The moon drifted further across the sky, ahead of him now, leaving him behind. Footfalls sent shockwaves through his skull, the only evidence his feet were still there. Hands raised hesitantly to catch himself on trees, his limbs brittle as the boughs above that fought half heartedly against the wind. His body could no longer melt the oncoming snow and icy rivulets flowed motionless on his cheeks. The back of his shirt was a thick sheet of ice that clapped and stabbed at him with every step. No more chilled needles prodded his legs, they only burned with a strange heat that was both intense and distant. The only part of him that still moved freely was the chain bearing his dying god that danced upon his chest.

Then he fell. Terror came at the falling and for a breath he thought he might wake up. But he found himself once again drowning in the white flood that buried his hands in its shuffling conformity. He looked back to find still the single set of tracks leading him to this point. Below him was the chaotic drifts he had created in the perfect flood. Had he created it? Maybe his invisible guide had fallen in the exact same spot before and there was still no evidence he had been there. Maybe if he walked backward around the last hill he would find his wingless angel lying there in the snow and it would be like he had never moved at all.

He clapped his hands to his head. His teeth ground and scraped against each other. He pounded his knees with his fists, sending a cloud of snow and frost into the air, then he began to run. Every bone and muscle pushed back against this thrust. Every step threatened to break loose and send him back to the earth, but still he ran. He ran toward the footprints of his invisible guide and they ran on ahead of him past more trees, more hills, more flood. As he ran the rivulets on his cheeks began to flow again, the sheet of ice on his shirt broke apart, littering the ground with its remnants, the Lamb sang with the choir of links about his neck.

Suddenly the invisible guide drove with reckless abandon up a towering wave directly before him. He charged headlong to the incline, clawing hands and thrusting feet bearing him upward, grasping branches, slipping over rocks, scrambling furiously to its pinnacle. At the crest of the wave he clambered to his feet and shuffled to a precipice. The hill cut downward sharply in a concave sweep of exposed earth and wandering roots that vanished into a canopy of trees. The canopy glittered with fallen stars among black branches and pine needles, sweeping toward an unseen horizon that made no distinction between heaven and earth. Here and sometimes there the canopy shifted and swayed, betraying itself not as the sky, but as a reflection of it, the world an ocean that struggled to mimic its infinite maker.

The boy breathed deeply. His heart slowed and the chill gripped him again, tighter now like icy hands clasped around his very bones. Behind him he was unsurprised to find one set of prints. None lead left or right, but directly to his spot. He grabbed a wet branch near him and leaned over the precipice. Through the mass of branches and roots beneath there was little to find. What might have been a rustle in the flood caught his eye. He could not be sure. He looked up again, scanning the ocean of trees. No campfires sprung from between the glittering waves. No flashlights or porch lights broke through the darkness. Only endless stars, in all their emptiness.

Feet flew from beneath him, his hand slipped noiselessly off the branch, roots flying up as a cloud of whips to meet him. Through the roots he tumbled, onto rocks and dirt and into snow, rolling. His body flailed with reckless abandon, arms battered against trunks, legs pierced by rocks, rolling. His descent slowed and his body came to a halt in a shallow ditch. He lay prostrate in a ditch, waiting for time, which had lost its way at his fall, to return to him. 

He lifted his head from the snow. His neck crackled. He was nearly consumed by the flood. His limbs groaned as they bent, lacerated arms pushing him upward. He did not stand as he knew his right leg would not bear it. The snow was blackened by its blood. Behind him was the wave, rising out of eyesight, its crest looming hidden by the web of branches he was once again caught under. Before him was something else entirely. A path. A level stretch of the white flood absent of trees drove on in either direction out of sight. 

He hopped onto his left leg, his right quivering and hanging there toe deep in snow. Among the hoofprints of deer there were other tracks on the path. Not the footprints of his invisible guide. These were tire tracks. He looked closer. The tire tracks were strange. There were no treads and they were thin. Wider than a bicycle but not wide enough to be from a vehicle. He looked left and right, wondering which way to follow them. If he walked for long enough he should find the tracks becoming filling in from continued snowfall. Then again, it was still snowing so this might not help him at all. If he was going to begin walking with his injured leg, he had to know the right way. Then the hoofprints caught his eye again. There was only one set and they didn’t wander across the path, they drove directly down the center of the tire tracks.

It was a horse pulled wagon...where was he? The hoofprints lead off to his left. Outside of the snow strewn chaos of his fall he found the prints of his invisible guide again, straddling the path in the same direction. He hobbled on. His right leg constantly dragged behind, willing to bear no weight. He used his left arm for balance and his right to clasp tightly his mother’s crucifix. The arms of the cross stabbed at his palm, making its presence known.

Droplets of blood were scattered about his invisible guide. Obviously they had reached the path in the same manner as him. Each moment of distraction drew immediately back to the pain and the cold. It was consuming him. It had consumed him, he just hadn’t succumbed to it yet. He could not focus on putting one foot in front of the other for the pain in his dragging leg. He could not focus on the threatening beauty of the web above him as his wandering mind was fit to lose grip of consciousness. He could not focus on his invisible guide as their blood littering the ditch drew him toward despair. The droplets foretold that they would be as helpless and injured as he and they would both die here together, or alone. His mind spun rapidly past all of these deliberations again and again, his only solace the fleeting hope at taking another step, passing another tree, rounding another curve in the path. He was getting further, always further.

Past the next tree a light flitted over the path and against the maze of trunks. This light was inconstant, feebly, but golden against the white beyond. He stopped, breathing deep, ragged breaths, then bounded forward. His whole body swayed and twisted with his efforts. The chain dug into his neck from a heavy arm that bore all its weight upon the cross. 

Just around the next corner. Just around the next corner, “Hey!” he waved his left arm high, “Hey!”

Rounding the corner he stopped so abruptly the momentum nearly threw him to the earth. The light flitted here and there, brighter until it reached its source. Two torches rested in sconces fastened to the posts of a wooden gate. It stood at least fifteen feet with a platform atop weathered double doors that groaned on their hinges in the wind. These doors creaked open to reveal to persons stomping out into the night. Leather boots trudged through the snow, green and brown pants lead up to green and brown tunics padded underneath. Atop their heads were metal helmets dull and rusted that reflected no light. Below the helms and atop the tunics were pale faces scowling as a dog kicked during its nap. In leather gloved hands were the staves of halberds, ornate craftsmanship chipped and worn.

The boy’s body shook, his joints locked, eyes wide.

“Hoos therr!” one hollered.

The other slapped the first’s arm with the back of his hand and pointed at the boy, “I’ll be,  _ look _ ! It’s a moor!”

The boy’s head shot to the right, finding his invisible guide’s trail scattering off into the trees. He looked back at the men.

“Get im!”

“Fuck!” The boy shot across the path, arms flailing, both legs now carrying him as best they could. He turned this way and that, falling, scrambling up, stumbling and pushing himself from the earth, pulling himself past trees with both hands. He leapt behind a tree hidden by a thicket, holding his breath, suppressing a cough. His body heaved and struggled for air. He closed his eyes, resisting any sound or movement with clenched teeth. War drums boomed in his skull.

His eyes opened. His teeth felt as if they would shatter. Beside him, soaking into the snow, was a small pool of blood. Not from his leg. Not from him. He looked up to find a wooden stave plummeting toward his eyes. 

Then nothing.


	2. Chapter 2

Was he now lost on the ocean? The black world roiled and sheathed, rough waters casting him to a fro. He drifted through space without time or direction until the moment he noticed the sack over his head. A pale white light glittered through the threads, sometimes deafened by shadows, like a spider web in a gale. The rolling seething world aligned with the sound of large wooden wheels tumbling through snow and mud. Horse hooves beat a low rhythm ahead. Metal and wood whinged constantly all about him. He was bitterly cold, but not as cold as in the night. His mother’s crucifix shuffled clinking about his neck, but a much lower, more ambling clinking sounded from between his hands. The icy manacles did not fit his wrists. Here they hardly grazed his skin, there they dug into the palms of his hands.

He rose to stand but his legs threw him back to his seat, his shoulders striking bars that rose up from the carriage. He beat his manacles against the bars, “Hey! Let me go you crazy mother fuckers!”

“Shut yer mouth or I’ll shut it for ya!” called from above the sound of trodding hooves.

“Stop it, you’ll make him angry!” whispered directly in front of him.

He shot back against the carriage bars again, eyes wide even though he could see nothing. Was this his invisible guide? “Who’re you?”

“Name’s Horst, not that it matters,” the voice quivered like glass struck with a spoon, “Won’t have much use for a name at the gallows.”

“The gallows?”

“That’s where we’re both headed, ten to one.”

“The gallows.” he said under his breath.

“Right, you deaf? It’s the hangman for us. Especially for you.”

His head sank into his manacled hands, “Oh, God.”

The voice steadied as it grew more condescending, “You best accept that. I know I have. Not the first of my line to take up the noose. Probably won’t be the last.”

He looked up, “Why  _ especially _ for me?”

“Well, you’re a moor. Why are you in this part of the world anyway? I thought moors lived on piles of bones beyond the seas.”

“I’m not a moor. I don’t even know what that is.”

“Nope, you’re a moor all right. Sure as my eyes can tell me. I thought you might be a woodland creature but they tend to be more, uh...  _ ay _ -thereal.”

He was glad the voice could not see his expression, “Horst, you said?”

“As my mother named me.”

“Right, yeah, look, we have to get out of here.”

“You’re goddamned mad! I’ll take the noose over freezing to death or worse! We’d probably be eaten by nephilim!”

Above the trodding hooves the voice boomed again, “I said  _ shut _ yer fecking mouth! You want me to come back there?”

“See? Nothing gets past him.”

He listened for any other sounds of hooves, “Is it  _ just _ him?”

“Now, don’t get any shifty ideas. You’ll land us in a heap of trouble.”

“We’re already in a heap of trouble.” he grabbed at the sack about his neck, twisting and feeling for the tie. He found the chord and the knot, a small thread of string that his frozen fingers were ill equipped to manage, "Help me with this." leaning forward to Horst.

"It won’t do no good, I tell you! They’ll-”

“Horst, you’ve got two options. You can maybe die, or you can  _ definitely _ die. That’s it.”

If his heartbeat had not been pounding in his ears he was sure he would have been able to hear Horst’s. After a weathering pause manic hands gripped at the knot at his neck. He was tugged and pulled with little grace, only able to hope that progress was being made. One fierce tug caused him to lose balance and a manacled wrist slammed against the seat of the cart.

The carriage stopped, “God dammit!” called from above absent horse hooves. Boots splashed into muck and began moving behind and past him.

He ripped furiously at tie, catching threads here and there that slipped free, “We have to charge him.”

“You’re mad! We’re done for!” Horst's body shuffled back, conforming to the bars behind it.

A key turned in a lock, metal creaked on hinges, “Alright! Ye don’t want to die in the square? Ye can die right here!”  
“Horst!” the knot came loose. He gripped the bottom of the sack and dragged it upward, a white light blinding the bottom of his field of view as a fist gripped his shirt and threw him from his seat down, down onto the cold wet earth. Boots splashed in the muck beside him. 

He lurched and screamed as a dull roar shot through his back. The next boot struck his shoulder blade and he spasmed, stinging with agony. He covered his head with his hands as a stray boot scraped the back of his neck. Then a blunt object came careening down upon his ribs. Down again upon his arm. Striking his thigh, his hands, his ribs again. He began to forget where he was being struck, dull roars flowing out from every part of him like ripples in a pond. 

A voice called out to him from somewhere in the distance, “I’ll have mercy on ye, just this once. As long as ye learn to-”

Roaring in his shoulder,

“Shut!”

Roaring in his ribs,

“Yer!”

Roaring in his stomach,

“Mouth!”

He was pulled onto his back, the sack dragged over his mouth again, the chord pulled so tight he could barely breathe. The collar of his t-shirt flew up, what little air he had left sucked out of him, his arms grazed the mud and snow. He flew for a moment, the spiderweb dancing kaleidoscopic before his eyes. Damp wood met him hard and familiar. Trembling feet shook under his limp body. Metal creak and clanged against itself, a key in a lock again. Trudging boots. A voice, “ _ Mad _ , I told you. I’ll take the gallows any day.” horse hooves. Wheels. Silence. Darkness. Rough waters.

Nothing.

A searing in his arms pulled him halfway to waking. His body dragged along the floor of the carriage then dropped, knees slapping on hard stone. Arms fully extended before him, the manacles lead his body by the wrists across a bed of stones that stretched on endlessly. A leather glove had a fistfull of the chains that bound him. Blood pooled in headwaters at his wrists, trickling down his arms in feeble rivers that inevitably lost their way to tumble over the side of their world down to the stones beneath. 

The stones were not natural. they were all flat on top, placed to conform more or less to one another. Stones suddenly vanished, replaced by wooden planks, but all about him he could hear footsteps, on the stones, on the planks, and voices, calm voices, yelling voices, protesting voices, proselytizing voices.

Suddenly his arms spasmed, rebelling against the pain in his wrists and pulling at his joints. He lost all sense of his surroundings, consumed by agony in every part of him. He shut his eyes tight and felt his mother’s crucifix gently bouncing against his forehead. There had to be an end to this soon. There had to be.

His face struck a dirty floor of smooth stone. A large door creaked. He was lifted by the shoulders and the two gloved hands launched him into darkness. The large door creaked and slammed and he lay there, motionless. The stench was suffocating, but the darkness and silence hid his pain from the rest of the world. None of those men were able to watch him suffer anymore.

Consciousness was a fickle friend to him, rarely embracing him fully, sometimes abandoning him entirely, most of the time floating just outside of his mind where all of his thoughts strayed away from him. In his most lucid moments, there would only be pain, a long, gripping pain that existed beyond time, stretching from before a time he remembered to a place he might never reach. During these moments his eyes stared up into black nothingness, pleading, begging for the pain to stop, begging for mercy, or at least for understanding. He was given none of these but the fleeting suppressant of unconsciousness.

He snapped awake. There was a light before him. His arms fought angrily against his effort to sit up, threatening to throw him back to the stone. The yellow inconstant light shone down through a window in the door, split by black bars. He would not be able to stand to see what was beyond it for a while. Before him was a bowl, rough hewn from wood. Within it was a small loaf of bread. He dragged himself to it, ignoring the biting anger of his whole body. He snatched the bread and bit into it. It was hard as stone and tasted of nothing at all. The other side of the bread was softer and wet. The bowl was filled with water. Resisting the urge to drink the entire bowl at once, he dipped the bread in the water and carefully ate every last crumb, then sipped the bowl until it was empty and licked the muddy wood for every last drop.

He set the bowl down and pushed his back up against the wooden door, legs outstretched. He could not tell whether he was still hungry or simply sick. His body was a mystery to himself. The light that sprayed into the room was dim and wavering, casting before him like a searchlight he could hardly manage to keep still. It's faint radiance shone upon a patch of rotting hay smothered in filth. A rat scampered into the thin beam and turned to him, standing on its hind legs, sniffing the foul air.

"Hey there, little guy." the words caught in his mouth, each syllable sputtering in a haze of dry lips and sticky cheeks that he could hardly hear or understand.

The rat vanished again into the darkness beyond. An ache coated his throat, tears flooded his eyes and his whole body heaved with aching sobs. He dropped his head in his dirty hands, tears spilling over his palms, tried to curl his legs to hug them but the pain was too much. Each heave a knife in his side he became a cacophony of trembling whimpers and agonized yelps. He wanted it to end. He needed it to end all of it right now. There was no thoughts no hope screaming silence into an abyss that every moment he realized again was still there and always had been.

His head fell back against the door. He looked up at the ceiling that was not there and drank a deep, spasming breaths. Each one stabbed at him but filled his lungs all the same. Behind him the source of the light crackled in its wanderings. Beyond this were spatterings of shifting and shuffling things bigger than rats and the rats too clicked their nails along the stones. Everywhere the air hung stagnant damp and cold, though not so cold as the forest. His toes, once red, had returned to brown. They rose still as mountains before him in the flickering light.

Bars clanked nearby, "Eh, moor! You alive in there or did you  _ cry _ yourself to death?"

He pursed his lips and looked left toward Horst's voice for no reason, "Yeah, I'm here."

"Fecking tough one, aren't you? Not a peep for I don't know how long and I was sure you were dead!"

Other voices broke through the stillness, "Shut it, Horst. I hear enough of your jabbering at market." "Did he say there's a  _ moor _ in here?" "How close are we to ration, I'm dying."

"You shut it! I'm trying to have a conversation. Eh, what's your name?"

He tried to weigh his options but his thought swam like mud in puddles. What was the harm in it? There must be some. He couldn't think.

"Well come on now. I told you mine, I think I well deserve to know yours."

He scoffed, "I don't think I owe you  _ shit _ after the beating you let me take."

"Hey, I didn't promise you  _ nothing _ . In fact I think I did warn you I did that that would turn out bad if you tried it."

"If we'd worked together we could've gotten out of it."

"Might be, but que sera and all that. Now, if your name ain't  _ moor _ I'd like to know it."

"...Kevin."

"Kevin, eh? Odd name."

"Thanks."

"Why are you here then, Kevin?"

"Your guess is as good as mine."

"Ah, I see. Your lord don't tell you much does he?"

"What?"

"Go to this place, look at this, find this bauble, bring it back. Must be frustrating. My legerdemain always says the  _ key to good management is communication _ ."

"Are you high?"

"What?"

"What the fuck are you talking about?"

"Well you're a moor spy, ain't you?"

"A spy? A spy for what?"

"The Moors of course. No use being cloak and dagger about it now, everyone knows."

"That's insane! I'm fourteen!"

"Young for sure, but old enough to be a man and if you're training since birth you must have all kinds of tricks on you. That's what I admire about you moors. I didn't become an apprentice until I was your age. Barely getting into my britches at seventeen now. If I had started as young as you, oof, reckon I'd be master by now."

"I'm not a spy!"

"Then why were you traipsing about the woods at all hours then?"

"I don't know!"

"Hm.  _ Convenient _ ."

Kevin shook his head and looked about the darkness, searching for something to put his mind on. A thought returned, looming large over him, “Horst, you said they’re going to kill us.”

There was a stiff pause, “Not really a subject I’m keen on discussing at the fecking moment, Kevin.”

“If they’re going to kill us, why are we locked up in here?”

An audible sigh, “We have to go to trial first.”

“We’re going to get a trial? If there’s a trial, how are you so sure we’ll be killed?”

“We’re guilty aren’t we? No sin slips by the Lord’s judgement.”

“What do you mean?”

“Oh, I suppose, you probably don’t know the Father where you’re from. The Lord of Farlind Hold only facilitates our trial. The Lord on High, the Father, hands down final judgement.” Horst paused, his voice lowering, beginning to quiver, “We will be punished for our transgressions.”

“How does God hand down the judgement? How do they know what he wants?”

A loud clank shot from the bars of Horst’s window, “I’m through talking about it! To Hell with you and your questions! It’s not my fecking line to teach you everything to where the sun goes at night!”

A voice called from far beyond, “Keep quiet in there, ye miserable bastards!”

Kevin breathed deeply, grasping his mother’s crucifix tightly to his chest. He closed his eyes and prayed, hoping to find his own judgement with God. Before he had finished his prayers, sleep came again.

The hours passed like days. The days fluid and unchanging. Always the torch flickered through the bars, always there was shuffling in the cells beyond, always there were rats. The ration of stale bread and muddy water came not often enough, but the ache of hunger was paled by the ache of his body. Kevin relieved himself in the corner of the room, each time in horrible pain, but each time less painful than the time before. He never felt well, but he could now stand with effort. Warmth was a distant memory and more than ever, he wished not to be wet anymore. The dampness of the floor and walls was inescapable and its murky filth was everpresent. 

The rats passed frequently through the beam of light on the floor. He talked to them casually and began to name them after his friends who he would never see again. Leo, Ty, and Jason roamed aimlessly about his cell. They all looked identical and they all did the exact same thing. They would wander into the light, sniff for food, and leave. Kevin appreciated the company although he had no way of knowing if there were three rats, or one, or if he had never seen the same rat twice.

He and Horst would speak often. He would stand, gritty fingernails grasping about the bars and watch the flame beyond as they spoke. He learned very little from his conversations with Horst. This partly because Horst knew very little. He was in a city called Farlind. Or a region called Farlind. Or a country called Farlind. Or possibly all three. He mostly learned about how Horst was a thief, and likely not a very good one despite his continuous attestations to the contrary. Horst was mostly unwilling to answer his questions or provide context and most conversation ended with Horst becoming distant, despondent and sometimes hostile about their inevitable execution. He was also totally unwilling to discuss the possibility of escape.

In the hours between their conversations Kevin made a game of throwing his mother's crucifix up into the air and scrambling around to find it by the sound of its fall. Once there was a long stillness between it leaving his hand and clinking on the stones. He wondered in that moment whether it would ever come back down again.

By now several groups of inmates had cycled through the cells beyond, but he and Horst remained. Day after day bodies shambled in and out down the corridor, but never past him. He shoved his face into the damp bars and could just see from the corner of his eye the ragged souls in all manner of tunics and breaches weathered and beaten, shoved by metal helmed men to their destination beyond Horst’s cell. There were cells in front of him and to his left stretching on, all empty, their wooden bars lifted, doors swinging into blackness. He was at the end of the line.

Eventually he stopped talking to the rats and stripped them of their names. He would sit silently, staring into nothingness, squeezing the crucifix with his quivering hand until sweet sleep came again.

"Too long…" murmured from Horst's cell, "It's been too long."

"Hey, at least we're not dead yet."

"No, they're treating us different and that's bad. Being treated different is always bad." that familiar trembling in Horst's voice, "They get you, they hold you, one, two days tops, you get your trial then they let you go or they hang you. This ain't how things are done."

Kevin had nothing to respond with.

"We're done fecked."

"How long have we been in here?"

"Too long, I already said!"

"Alright, alright, chill out."

"What's that even mean? And who are you anyway? Telling me what to do? I would be long gone by now if it weren't for you! I'm still here because of you! Whatever happens to me is your fault cause you've been talking to me! They think I know something cause they think I'm friends with a Moorish spy!"

"Like I said, we need to get out of here. You don’t need to worry about any of that and you don’t need to die if we just escape.”

“Damned with your escape! You don’t even have a plan! Probably better you’re in here anyway so me and mine don’t have a Moorish army coming down on our heads!”

“If you don’t help me escape, the only thing that’ll be coming down on your head is a noose. I need your help with the plan. You’re the one who knows how this place works, not me. Help me, and we can make a plan, and we can get out alive.”

There was a long silence. Water dripped, rats scurried, the air hung, as it always did, heavy and damp over the two doomed boys, “Where should we start?”

The door at the end of the corridor creaked and slammed. Leather boots stamped down its length and came to a stop at Horst’s cell. Kevin could just see the back of the metal helm, struggling to reflect the torchlight through dull rust.

“No! It’s him! Take him! He did it, not me! He bewitched me! Whatever it is I didn’t mean to! Please!”

Horst’s cell door groaned on its hinges and Kevin saw a matt of wild hair pulled from the cell and dragged down the corridor screaming. When the last door slammed, the silence that followed was the longest of all.


	3. Chapter 3

Kevin sat against the door, legs splayed before him in the same way he had for as long as he could remember. Time passed in its unchanging stagnation. The only evidence of time’s existence in this place was Kevin’s memory of thoughts he had a moment ago.

A rat passed into the light before him. A nameless thing, unbound by time, passing into the light only to prove to others that it exists, then erasing itself again. Kevin squinted at the rat and a thought came to him of how it must scurry between holes in the cells. It must escape through holes in the walls. He stood quickly, immediately regretting this for the pain in his joints. He walked about the cell, feeling every stone and every inch of every stone. He started low and moved higher, pushing and pulling at each one. Crossing a corner he stepped in a pile of his own excrement and groaned, scraping his foot on the damp wall. 

Further down, on the wall opposite Horst's cell, a stone came loose. He grasped and pulled and tugged at it until it flew loose from the wall and he fell backwards, landing on his lower back. His scream was muffled by grinding teeth. The stone was still clenched between his fingers, large enough to fill his whole grasp. Rising again, he found the space in the wall where the stone was. Solid mortar filled the recess with no sign of the other side. He stamped his foot and yelled again through clenched teeth, throwing the stone with a deafening  _ clack _ against the wall.

His breath was shallow, eyes wandering the darkness, searching for something more in his mind than in the cell. Leaning down, he scratched a fingernail along the mortar recess. Flecks of gray dust came loose and ground into his nail bed. He scrambled for the rock again and shoved it into the recess, frantically scraping the mortar free. Several times he was forced to stop for the pain in his arm and shortness of breath. The faintest patter of the mortar fragments falling to the floor sounded like a landslide in his ears. It wasn’t much. But it was something.

Suddenly the rock scraped hard stone. He paused for a moment then dug at it a little more. This must have been the stone that formed the other side of the wall. He furiously dug around it, carving its roundness from the mortar. When a space the size of his palm was exposed, he set the rock down and pushed against it. There was not even the slightest implication of movement. He pushed again, then again with his fist, then with both hands. Picking up the rock he scraped away at the mortar again and tried pushing once more to no result. Bracing his left arm against the wall, he looked around and listened for any disruptions in the silence. Then his right arm pulled back with the rock held firm, aiming for the exposed stone. He breathed deeply.

The door at the end of the corridor creaked open. Kevin's head spun, staring into the blank darkness behind him. Leather boots stamped the floor, accompanied by something else... something dragging along it. Horst's cell door opened and a body was thrown inside, the slap of wet flesh striking stone pulsing along the walls.

Kevin set the stone down softly as the leather boots approached. The wooden bar lifted and his cell door swung open. Torchlight flooded the room, filling him with shame at the piles of excrement filling the far corner. The silhouettes of two metal helmed figures towered in the doorway.

"Yer turn, moor."

He stood, slow steps carrying him across the small room as he looked around for any means of escape.

"Get along!"

One of the helmed figures grabbed him by the arm and dragged him from the room. The other raised manacles, clasping them with a cruel carelessness around Kevin's wrists. A gloved hand spun him and shoved him down the corridor. He nearly fell, but kept his balance. At the end of the hall Kevin's blood beat like drums in his ears again. A helmed man passed him, unlocking the door with a key on a ring at his side. 

As they passed through the doorway, Kevin’s drumming ears rose to a crescendo before abruptly fading away. This was a small room, lit by torchlight, with a rough wooden table, a chair, and a pile of long neglected papers scattered to one side of it. The papers were coarse, thick and yellow with many nicks and imperfections on their edges. Beside them was a small glass jar filled with ink. A feather quill leaned along its rim. He had little time to contemplate this before he was shoved through the next door. Up a flight of treacherously steep stairs they came to another small room. This one was more richly decorated. A rug covered the floor, a stained wooden desk sat to his right, and shelves lined the walls with all sorts of baubles and items that looked of little worth. They passed this room quickly and he stepped into a hall that ran ahead of them twice as long as the corridor below and much taller. His head drew back to look at the arched ceiling of wood and stone flying perhaps two dozen feet over his head. Banners with various symbols and gilded iconography lined the walls and directly halfway between the door behind them and the end of the hall ahead was a break in the wall that lead into another massive hall he could barely see into. Opposite this hall were two towering double doors. These doors were an exit. He knew it. They may not be the doors he would want to escape through, but there must be other ways out of here close by. 

Out of this  _ castle _ . He was in a castle. The two helmed men rushed him up a spiral staircase to their right. The massive stone structure fascinated him with its beauty and horrified him with its implications. He didn't think there were castles anywhere near his home. He didn't think there were any castles in his  _ country _ . Slits of windows shot spears of light into the stairwell. He tried to peek through them but was shoved on before his eyes could adjust to the blinding daylight. Atop the stairs they entered another corridor. Torch smoke clouded the ceiling, foaming outside through more slit windows to the right. To the left were many more corridors and rooms, with many people bustling in and out of them. White men in tunics and white women in aprons and dirty dressing carrying things of all manner. One of the rooms was a kitchen with a large oven of stone and dozens of these people rushing around it. Was this a cult? Had they built this castle in the country near his home recently? The stones looked very old.

He was turned up another flight of stairs. With every ascent the castle grew hotter and torch smoke filled more of the air. He coughed, resting a hand on the wall to keep himself moving. It came away covered in soot. He wiped the filth on his boxers, though they were no cleaner. In truth, he may have been disgusted by the dirt and grime covering this fortress, had it not been for the place he had just come. 

Atop this last stair the helmed men behind him slowed. Another short hall greeted them with many wooden doors on each side. A long rug covered the wooden floor, a red splash in an otherwise grey and brown abode. Kevin was directed to the first door on the right. A helmed man cocked his head toward the door, his grimace devoid of passion. Kevin stepped forward, placed a hand on the door, and pushed. It did not budge. He cleared his throat. The helmed men were more than silent. There was a circular handle of black metal hanging like an old knocker. He grabbed this and pulled, then he tried pushing again. The door stood firm. 

“Ye turn it, ye damned fool!”

Kevin immediately twisted the handle. Metal grated in the frame and the door opened, drifting away from him as if by its own accord. Within was a shadow, glowing at its rim in a white halo. It loomed above another red carpet. It stood before a crackling fireplace and behind a gilded wooden desk with a chair on each side of it. About this shadow were shelves lined with books and strange tools. Some of these shelves were short with portraits above them that reached nearly to the ceiling. The shadow stood before a central portrait hanging above the fireplace. The light of the fire pulsated around the shadow and across the room. Kevin stepped within the room, the chains at his wrists clinking. The shadow’s head turned slightly. A metal helmed man leaned into the room, grabbed the door handle and slowly closed it behind Kevin without a sound.

The boy looked forward. The glowing shadow extended an arm. Kevin realized he was being motioned to sit in a chair in front of the desk. He stood still. The shadow turned, black hair and pale skin glowing in the firelight. Hidden eyes stared at him. Coarse fingers grasped the back of the chair behind the desk. One hand raised again toward the opposite chair. Kevin stood still. His finger twitched and he balled both hands into fists, staring back, slowing his breathing.

The raised hand fell and the shadow turned to a shelf beside the fireplace. On it was a copper carafe and a glass jar filled with long wooden wicks. The shadow took a wick from the jar and held it in the fire, below a metal pot that hung there. He returned to the desk, pulled the chair from its place and sat. One hand took a black pipe from the desk and raised it. The other hand dipped the flaming wick into the pipe bowl, illuminating a smooth face with black eyebrows and black eyes that fixed their brooding darkness upon Kevin. The wick was snuffed with a wave of the hand then tossed on the desk. Smoke billowed from around the shadow, billowing plumes caught in the white halo. The shadow shifted in the seat to recline, resting one leg over the other. This position made one black eye visible to Kevin and revealed the black hair was shot with streaks of silver. A white doublet had formed the halo. Sanguine lining plumed from the tight fit sleeves and torso. Thread roses swam with their black stems up the shadow’s waist to the neck. A long white skirt opened in the middle and draped over the seat to the floor. Blood red silk breeches lead to shoes that glimmered like wet pearls. 

Kevin’s eyes wandered about the room. The long portraits were of elderly white men in similar doublets and robes, though absent of roses. All were unremarkable aside from the one above the fireplace that had fixed the attention of the shadow. It displayed the bust of someone in massive white robes with many folds and layers. A white hat, feathered in the middle like a head of lettuce, sat upon the head of this figure and rose from center frame to the ceiling. Within these decorated accoutrements was a face unlike anything Kevin had never seen. It was stark white, smooth as milk, hairless as a newborn. The one visible ear had a pointed tip and it had black eyes, but not like the eyes of the shadow. These had no white around the pupil and no visible eyelids. It was as if there was only an endless void within the sockets.

Kevin’s eyes descended back to the shadow, which was no longer paying him any mind, seemingly contented with the pipe. He felt as if they were no longer in the same room. He breathed a deep, quiet breath, “You should really let me go.”

The shadow’s head almost imperceptibly raised toward him, then returned to the pipe. 

Kevin looked around the room, searching for the right words. He approached the chair, pulled it away from the desk and the shadow, and sat, leaning in, “Look, man, I don’t know what’s going on here and I don’t care, I just want to go home. Let me go.”

“Neither I, nor anyone else in this place hath the power to release thee.”

Kevin lurched back at the words, “Why are you talking like that?”

“Thou doth dislike mine manner of speech? Let it be known that I also find thine to be most…  _ imprecise _ .”

Kevin sat, mouth slightly ajar for a moment. Then he slumped back heavily in the chair, arms slapping his thighs, chains dancing, “Fuck it, let’s get this over with then.”

The shadow shifted noisily, resting the arm with the pipe on the desk, “Dost thou take delight in thine accommodations?”

“What?”

“Fie, how wouldst thou say it?” The shadow stared intently at the wall for a moment, “Do you like your cell?”

Kevin huffed an indignant laugh, “It’s wet and covered in shit.”

“Forsooth, this was made plain to me the moment thou didst enter the room.”

“Can you just talk like a human being?”

The shadow took another pause, “If it will cease thine…  _ your _ indignation, then surely.”

“Great. No, I don’t like my cell. Why?”

The shadow waived the pipe in the air, “Well, you only seem… eager, to begin our proceedings as swiftly as possible.”

Kevin offered no response. 

“You see, I had presumed that as you would likely wish to spend as much time out of your cell as possible, and I, being sore in the arse from a long road behind me and sorer still for the thought of the road ahead tomorrow, would draw out these proceedings beyond their natural length. For both our sakes.”

Kevin shook his head, “Why can’t you just let me go?”

“You have broken the law, several times, in fact. Due process is not a fickle thing. But again, this topic will inevitably lead to the swifter end of our meeting. Would you not rather afford yourself the opportunity to…” The shadow looked him over, head to toe, “dry off?”

Kevin snarled at the shadow, “Whatever, I’ll take the cell, since you’re being such a prick.”

The shadow swung his leg to the floor and leaned over the desk, “To our official business then.” Rising, slamming the pipe against the wall of the fireplace to empty its contents, then sitting again, the shadow breathed a heavy sigh. One hand took a pile of heavy papers from the top corner of the desk and lay them in the center. The other set the pipe on the desk and took a quill from an inkwell in the other corner, tapping it gently on the glass rim and holding it over the paper, “May I have your name?”

“Kevin. May I have yours?”

The shadow looked frightfully unamused.

“You want to draw this out? I got my questions too.”

An actual smile crossed the darkened lips, “I am Kedric Montpilliara, Grand Inquisitor of the Papal States, Duke of Lindenshire.”

“The Papal States?”

“Wait your turn.” An index finger raised form the quill, “Is it simply Kevin?”

“What?”

“Do you have a surname?”

“A what name?”

Another heavy sigh, “A surname. What is your family name, Kevin? Or from where do you hail?”

“Oh, Armstrong. And America, I guess.”

“Well done, and your age?”

“Hey, it’s my question.” Kevin caught himself, not knowing what to ask.

“My apologies, take your time.” Kedric tossed the quill into the inkwell and leaned back in his chair.

“The Papal States… like the Pope?”

“Correct.”

“So we’re in Italy.”

“Your question has been answered. Now-”

“That didn’t count!”

“It most certainly did. Now, your age, my dear Kevin.”

“Fourteen and a half. So we’re in Italy, right?”

“No, no, I have never heard of this land.” 

Kevin’s eyes widened, his mouth hung limply ajar. He composed himself quickly.

“You said you hail from America-”

“Yes. So-”

“That was not a  _ question, _ it was a  _ clarification _ .” consonants split the air like cracking wood, “Where is America? Could you point it out on a map?”

Kevin’s eyes widened again. He was losing control of his breathing. He wiped sweat from his brow, noticing the room felt much hotter than when he had arrived, “I really don’t even know where to start with that question.”

“I do.” Kedric stood, pulled a scroll from a bookshelf, unrolled it and held it before Kevin. It was a map. The shapes of nations and the lines drawn between them and the oceans were utterly unrecognizable. The names of these places even more so.

“What is this?”

“A map of the known world, obviously. Can you point toward America?”

Kevin’s head fell fully into both hands, “Fucking Christ! Where am I!”

The map was swiftly rolled and returned to the shelf, “You invoke the Lord’s name in vain. May I assume you reject Jesus Christ and all his teachings?”

“I’m Catholic. Go to church every Sunday.” Kevin pulled his mother’s crucifix from under his shirt. The cross tapped against the chains of his manacles and spun. “But now I get two questions.”

“As you wish.”

Kevin’s heart immediately sunk, all the confidence drained from him. He looked around the room, tears welling in his eyes. For a moment he had forgotten why he was there, in that room, with the shadow. The reason was all he could think about now. His voice caught, “What would you ask? If you showed up out of nowhere in a place you had no idea where it was or how to get back and nothing you saw and nothing that happened made any sense and there was no one to help you and no way out. What would you ask?”

“Oh Lord, why have you forsaken me.”

Kevin folded in his chair, eyes in his palms, fingers grasping his hair, weeping. His chest heaved without control and without care. Tears streamed out of his hands, trickling between the manacles and his wrists. The whole world was miles away from him and in that moment he was utterly alone. The swirl of confusion and despair gave way to mundane realizations. His back burned sore from the heaving. He was choking on his own breath. The chains dangled in a strange way about his forearms. The shadow still sat there, offering no comfort, not even a sympathetic gaze. He was weeping, and he was being stared at with utter indifference. He wiped his eyes quickly, sitting up, staring back at the shadow with all the dignity he could gather through his blurred vision.

“You demanded a second question?”

He sat quietly. Deep steady breaths cleared his thoughts. One question permeated his mind. It had been lurking there, waiting, since he had first seen the helmed men in the forest. He dared not ask it, yet it was the only question to ask. Each syllable struck decisively in his mouth, “What is the date?”

“It is Tuesday, the Kalends of Aprili, in the year seven-hundred and ninety-five, Initium Novum.”

A sigh coursed through his whole body. His cheeks burned and he could barely breath for the heat of the room.

“Thou didst say thou dost attend church on Sunday, and thou art Catholic. Surely thou means to say thou art a member of a church? And what is a Catholic?”

Kevin gulped saliva, gathering his wits about him, “That’s two questions, which means I get two.”

“Enough games. I am tired and long for bed. We shall complete my business here, then part ways.”

He searched Kedric with his eyes, wondering what consequences further dissension might bring. If he was going to die anyway, there was little this shadow could do, “What are my charges?”

“Answer the question.”

“I want to know my charges.”

“They are the reason for my questioning.”

“Then tell me what they are.”

“It is royal business, thine charges. Thine knowledge of them changes nothing. The outcome is for me to determine.”

“Yeah, but  _ I’m _ that business. So I should know. I have rights.”

“I cannot possibly imagine what  _ rights _ thou art referring to.”

“My human rights, dude. Tell me my charges.”

“Ridiculous. What rights doth a human have that the Lord doth not bestow? There is the divine right only, which thou canst possibly comprehend. Now, answer the question.”

Kevin remained silent, attempting to cross his arms and finding the chain was not long enough. He rest his hands awkwardly on his knees. The pause lingered.

“So  _ be _ it.” the spittle pattered on Kevin’s forehead. Kedric drew a piece of paper from within the stack, hardly pretending to read it, “Thou art heretofore formally charged with… entering the Kingdom of Farlind absent formal documentation, operating as a spy for foreign entities, conspiring to usurp the Papacy, heresy, resisting arrest, indecent exposure, and, as evidence by our previous conversation,” quickly scribbling on the page with the quill, “blasphemy.” He looked up at Kevin, as if asking if he were satisfied.

Kevin shrugged, “Aren’t you gonna ask how I plead or whatever?”

“No.” tossing the paper onto the desk, “Again, that is for me to decide.”

“You think I’m a spy?”

“Absolutely not. I could discern thou were some lowly peasant from the instant I first laid eyes on thee. Thine penchant for political sabotage likely extends no further than urinating in the communal drinking water.”

“Cute. So, you’re gonna let me go?”

“Of course not!”

“You said I was innocent!”

“To my intuitions, indeed! Thou art no spy and no conspirator! Indeed, we may also throw out public indecency, insubstantial as the charge is. Still remaining art thou being present in this land illegally, resisting arrest and, most importantly, thine crimes against the Lord, which, if thou art found guilty, will reward thee with a swift and bloody execution.”

Kevin took a deep, steadying breath, “Okay, how do you decide that?”

“Yes, I suppose we might as well commence thine trial, after which this merciless task can be finished.” Kedric rose, whisking a handkerchief from the pocket of his breeches. He moved to the fireplace, took the lid off the metal pot, then took the carafe from the shelf and poured water sizzling into the pot, until it was nearly full. He placed the lid back on the pot and turned to Kevin. The room was almost unbearably hot.

“Come hither, my dear Kevin.”

“Why?”

“We cannot conclude my business until thou dost come.”

Kevin looked at Kedric, looked at the pot, then stood, dragging his feet in a slow march that left trails of filth on the red rug. He stopped an arms length from Kedric on a stretch of hard wood between the rug and the fireplace.

“My thanks. Now, please kneel.”

“For what.”

“Thou must kneel.” the shadow’s patience seemed to have returned, gesturing politely toward the hard wood.

“What, are you gonna knight me?”

kedric laughed, a deep genuine laugh, “Clever boy! Of course not, now please kneel.”

“I think I’ll stand.”

“Wouldst thou prefer to spend the whole night standing there, bickering with me?”

Kevin stared into deep black eyes for a moment, then knelt, sitting on his heels.

“Splendid, now-oh, yes!” Kedric scurried to the door, inched it open, and said something unintelligible to the men waiting outside. He returned with a key and motioned Kevin to raise his arms.

Kevin did so. Kedric was quite clumsy in unlocking them. The chains fell heavy to the floor and Kevin massaged his wrists.

Water began to boil in the pot, the lid gyrating angrily at bursts of water vapor. Kedric used his handkerchief to take the handle of the pot from the rack and set the pot on the wood floor in front of Kevin. He lifted the lid of the pot and set it upside down on the floor atop the handkerchief. Rising steam clouded Kevin’s sight and burned with the fire in a choking intensity. Sweat rippled down his brow.

“Certainly not ideal, but it will suffice.” Kedric smiled.

“What?” His eyes were blinking rapidly.

The voice spoke unseen through a cloud of vapor, “Necessarily, this is not supposed to be performed in the castle proper, yet the only alternative is to do so in the dungeons and I am not suited to that atmosphere.” 

“Okay, so what is  _ this _ ?”

“ _ This, _ is your trial.” Kedric drew a single golden coin from his pocket which Kevin could see glinting through the rising vapor. The coin hummed as it spun through the air, a dynamo, falling to land flat on the roiling sea in the pot, pausing for less than a moment before twisting into the abyss.

Kevin looked up from the waves, not finding the shadow, which was masked entirely by the billowing cloud, “Okay?”

A pause lingered, Kevin’s mind racing, then from behind the cloud, “Retrieve the coin.”

Kevin rocked back on the balls of his feet, as if pushed, “Are you fucking crazy?”

“Dost thou not believe in the infallible power of Christ?”

“Yeah, I do! I told you, I’m Catholic. But this-”

“Then retrieve the coin. If thou art truly innocent, the Lord’s Will shall protect thee and thine hand shall not be scathed. Of course, if guilty…”

“That’s literally not how anything works!”

“So thou dost doubt the Lord…”

The water spat ferociously, its chaotic waves spilling here and there to the floor. The room was scalding.

“Kevin, whether or not the water dost burn thee, I still highly recommend retrieving the coin.”

“Why.”

“For if thou takest the coin and are burned, thou shalt be guilty of heresy and executed by decapitation. Whereas, if thou dost fail or refuse to retrieve the coin, thou shalt be guilty of heresy and blasphemy, the punishment for which is burning at the stake.”

Kevin’s whole body shook, yet he could not move. With effort, he turned down toward the roiling waters, avoiding eye contact in the hopes of delaying action.

“Kevin.”

His head shot up to the unseen shadow again.

The smile was audible, “The water is cooling.”

The pillar of vapor drove madly from the pot. Droplets hurled from angry bubbles stung his face. He leaned closer, his mother’s crucifix swaying, dancing below his quivering chest. Foam from the casting waves left nothing visible below them. He breathed in quickly several times, then plunged his right hand into the pot. There was no pain at first. The white blinding temperature sent shards of ice through his whole body. Then the searing blaze of a thousand needles pierced through flesh from finger to forearm. Kevin screamed, lurching back, his arm rising from the blaze. But before his forearm could break halfway from the waves, coarse fingers flew from the cloud above, gripping his elbow and plunging him further into the depths.

Kedric’s face emerged from the cloud, wreathed in is plumes, black eyes flickering in the firelight, “Kevin, I implore thee to take the coin.” Kevin howled and gnashed his teeth, pulling to no effect against the clenched fingers, “I must attend thine execution, in whatever form, and I find the scent of burning flesh most unpleasant.”

Kevin reached, screaming, desperate, not feeling the coin so much as sensing its gratings on the bottom of the pot. He moved it along, an eternity, bracing it against the side of the pot and lifting it into his grasp. The coarse fingers still gripped like steel. "I got it!"

The fingers released him. He flew backward, a torrent of water splashed from the pot. He cried short, deep, unintelligible cries, opening his hand and observing it with wild hysteria. The coin did not fall from his palm. It hung there, shimmering gold, surrounded by purple blisters and the red oozings of the flesh flayed from him. At some indiscernible moment he had gone silent. His mind was light, swimming, nauseous. The fingers on his left hand reached for the coin, gripping its circumference. It was hot, but not noticeably so. Pulling it away, the flesh clung to it, tearing, leaving a strange mark. He looked at the coin, and found upside down a familiar face. Turning toward the portrait above the fireplace, he found the same pale, black eyed resemblance that looked back at him from the coin, and looked back at him from his hand.

The coin slipped through his fingers as he keeled over and vomited. 

"Oh, well that is simply splendid, Kevin, very well done."

Kevin's head swung around without his intent. The pot was back on the rack in the fireplace, Kedric was stamping on his handkerchief to soak the wet floorboards.

"I suppose I shan’t be cleaning thy mess, though I dare not imagine the complaint I shall receive from the lady of the house." The smile taught upon his cheeks.

Kevin wobbled back into an upright sitting position and sat, struggling to manage his short, ragged breaths. A hand gripped his right armpit and in that instant Kevin found the coin resting upon the floor nearby. The hand raised him quickly and without thinking, Kevin’s left hand shot toward the coin, snatching it up as he was lifted from the ground. He held it tight and hot in his palm as he met Kedric’s gaze before him.

“I cannot deride thee too much, I admit. For thine efforts, thou shalt have a swift execution, the better for the both of us.”

He was not so much standing as leaning entirely on Kedric’s hand. Kedric’s smile became an uncomfortable snarl and he called toward the door. The two metal helmed men entered quickly, gripping Kevin under both arms just as his feet completely fell away from him. It took every effort within him to Keep his grasp on the coin. Kedric wiped his hand thoroughly on his handkerchief, then tossed it onto the desk.

The metal helmed men turned and began dragging Kevin across the room, but Kedric called them again. He rushed from around Kevin’s line of sight and reached his arms carefully Kevin’s head, “Thou shalt have no need of this anymore.” Kedric backed away, the crucifix wavering on the chain between his fingers, “T’would be best if I keep it.”

Kevin’s breath caught in his throat. He opened his mouth as the shadow vanished from his sight and the helmed men began dragging him away. He jerked his head around, trying to see, trying to say anything that might get the necklace returned to him. Yet he knew there was nothing. The door closed behind him and he was carried toward the stairway. The shadow and his mother’s crucifix were gone. A dozen steps, an impossible distance away.

His shins slapped against the stone steps as they descended. He tried to walk but only slipped forward, the momentum nearly throwing him down the stair. The metal helmed men kept him in their grasp with an exasperated, “Goddammit!” One of them burped loudly. Kevin looked through hazy eyes at the wobbling footfalls and realized they were both drunk.

The coin detached from his sweaty palm and rested only on his shaking fingers. He grasped it tighter, focusing on keeping his fist closed around it while allowing the two beside him to carry his whole wait. He had never felt such pain in every part of him. His right hand and forearm burned with a dizzying intensity. The stair bobbed this way and that as cold sweat dripped from his brow. His grasp was loosening again, as was his consciousness. He held the coin tight and as they reached the foot of the stair, starting down the smoky hall, he began counting. One Mississippi. Two Mississippi. Three Mississippi. They reached the second spiral stair. His shins slapped on hard stone. Eight Mississippi. Nine Mississippi. Ten Mississippi. The bannered corridor passed by. Through the room with the baubles he met the steep and treacherous stair to his cell. His head shot back, eyesight slipping from him. He shook his head, nearly vomiting again. Fifteen Mississippi. Sixteen Mississippi. Seventeen Mississippi.

His body flew into darkness. As his chest beat on the stone floor, the coin bounced clinking away to the back of the cell. A prayer struck his heart that the helmed men would not notice. The door slammed behind him, wooden bar lowering. Its dull thud sounded the only prayer of his that was answered in this forsaken place.

He rolled onto his back, propping his right arm on his side so that it touched as little of his filthy body as possible. What would he do? What was his plan? They were going to kill him tomorrow. Could he finish digging out the wall and escape, or would this be too loud a process? Would the drunk guard notice or care? The coin was gold. Could it buy him a ride back home? Or was he in a place that no vehicle or horse could return him from?

This thought punctuated his mind as he lost hold of consciousness and the world slipped away completely.


	4. Chapter 4

They were going to kill him.

Kevin's eyes shot open and he breathed as if it were the first breath of his life. He sat up slowly, so slowly he nearly fell back again. Upon rising, sweat poured down his face and his right hand stung and ached with every slight motion. He tried to keep it perfectly still as he stood and looked around the room but the pain could not be avoided. He pulled his t-shirt off, being very careful to slip the sleeve off his arm with minimal contact. Still, some moments of this long process were agony. Turning the yellow cloth around in his left hand, he tried to find the cleanest part of it, though there was no portion of it not damp with sweat and rank water. Would covering his arm be helpful, or would wrapping it in this cloth only increase the chances of infection? He decided to take the chance as the mere air floating about his arm bit ferociously. Slipping the interior of the shirt over his forearm, he began wrapping it tight. He fell, leaning against the wall for the dizzying pain. Once it was wrapped, the ache was overwhelming, but a more dull pain than the sting of before.

He dragged himself along the wall, as fast as he could move, barely moving at all. A toe found the rock at the base of the wall and he knelt, nearly falling. He could not brace his right hand against the wall and he could not use it to strike with the rock. His left hand found the exposed stone in the mortar and pushed, even more uselessly than before. He placed his hand over the recess, keeping his eyes focused directly on this sightless black patch that was identical to all other black patches around it. Lifting the stone, he pulled back, and struck. The knuckle of his middle finger scraped against the stone atop the recess and the jolt of the strike rattled his right arm while the  _ clack _ of stone meeting stone hollered through the corridor. He winced, a tear rolling off his cheek as a voice cried out, “Quiet in there, damn ye!”

This wasn’t going to work. Kevin sat down, resting his right arm on his lap, throbbing. His teeth ground with frustration. Every movement he made was carefully designed to avoid pain, yet pain came all the same. There was a glint in the darkness at the back of the cell to his left. The coin. Why did he take it? Why didn't Kedric notice him taking it? I thought came to him. He crawled to the glimmering golden thing on three limbs, grasped in a fist, and braced that fist against the wall to bring him to his feet. He hobbled to the door of the cell, calling in a hoarse whisper, "Horst! Horst!" Grumbling then miserable sobs sounded from the cell next to him, "Horst!"

"What?"

Kevin put his arm through the bars, holding out the coin as far as he could, "How much is this worth?"

He waited, listening to shuffling and more sobs before finally, "Lord above! Where did you get your hands on that!"

His arm pulled back into the cell and he held the coin in the firelight, "So a lot..."

"Shame some guard'll get his filthy paws on it when they take us. Could make a life for myself with that."

"You ready to get out of here?"

"No! No! No more of your shifty ideas! Who knows, the more we talk I may have to visit the Inquisitor again. They wanna know what I know! I told them I don't know nothing and look what they did to me anyways! Hey, you told them I don't know none of your plans right?"

Moving back along the wall, he found the rock again and picked it up in the same hand as the coin. 

“Hey! You even listening to me? You told them right?”

Once again at the door, he placed the coin gently in the wrapped fingers of his right hand, propping it in the folds of cloth so as not to put any pressure on it.

“Damned moor! You told them right!”

Kevin slammed the rock as hard as he was able on the bars, sending an cacophony of sound down the corridor, “Hey! Hey, asshole!”

“The feck are you doing! You’ll get us killed!”

A booming voice echoed back, “Quiet in there, I said! You want a beating?”

Longer and louder, Kevin slammed the rock against the bars, finding just the right angle to make the sound pierce the eardrum, “Hey, you inbred redneck sack of shit! You gonna beat me like I did your mom last night!”

A chair banged against a wall, “Fecking shite! You’re getting it now!” The door at the end of the corridor slammed open, “There won’t be nothing left for the stake when I’m done!”

Kevin wobbled backward with a horrible slowness as leather boots pounded down the corridor. Just past the beam of torchlight he stood, bracing himself for balance. The yellow cloth held the coin before him, glimmering in the firelight. He felt like an exorcist raising the cross to some possessed soul. The rock was held firmly in his left hand, hanging in the darkness.

The cell door opened and the familiar silhouette stood there, wobbling more than Kevin, a club in one hand, “You ready, moor?” Upon the first step, the metal helmed man noticed the coin and stopped, “Now where did you get a thing like that?” The words slurred together, flowing with the sways of the body.

“You want it?”

“I’ll take it.” The silhouette took another rocking step forward, raising the club.

“Come get it.” Kevin thrust his right arm upward, ignoring the horrible pain. The coin shot into the darkness above and the silhouette showed the whites of the eyes, lunging with outstretched arms. Kevin shot forward with more force and speed than he had left, bringing the rock around in a wide circle to a bloody impact with the man’s hanging jaw. The body shot forward, barrelling Kevin to the floor. All of him seized with pain. His skull rang with the intensity of it, his vision black, his mouth gaping in a hollow scream. 

He found he had been focusing on one firelit image for a long time. The limp leather heel of the metal helmed man dangling over the earth by the toes of the boot. To his right, the door to the cell still swung wide. He struggled to his feet and wandered into the corridor. The door at the end seemed much closer now. Many hands grasped bars, many eyes peered at him through them. He turned to his right and found Horst, his mottle of brown hair, thin and ruddy as his ice white face that was peppered with freckles and acne.

Kevin hobbled over and lifted the bar to the cell, then pushed the door open. Horst peeked out, silent, eyes wide. When he stepped into the corridor, Kevin found the ragged thief to be a head taller than himself, with bones stretching visibly under his skin. Horst’s bubbling, furiously red arm called Kevin back to his predicament.

“Come on.” He motioned Horst toward his cell. 

Horst seemed to be making a serious effort to speak, but only half syllables stumbled from his tongue.

Kevin aimed a finger at the limp body in the dark, “We need to take his clothes.”

Horst stared at him confusedly.

“You’re going to wear them, then lead me out like I’m a prisoner.”

“They’re gonna flay us to bits.”

Kevin put a hand on Horst’s shoulder, “Hey, hey. They’re not gonna do shit to us if we get out of here. This is the last step, we just have to do it.”

Horst shook his head and lumbered slowly into the cell. The two boys stepped to either side of the limp body, wondering where to start. The utter silence surrounding the immobile form made Kevin wonder if the man were still alive. A wave of nausea flowed over him and he turned his mind to the task at hand. The boots, gloves and helm were fairly simple to take off, with the boys quickly learning they would have to use their two left hands in tandem. The breeches and tunic were another matter. This process took far longer than Kevin was comfortable with. They tried rolling the body with their feet and hands, propping it against the wall, and forsaking all strategy to pull at sleeves and pant legs for dear life, all while stopping for breaks every few motions to cool their exhausted limbs.

Eventually the body was stripped to its undergarments and Kevin assisted Horst in slipping on the muddied uniform. The right glove caused a fierce struggle as Horst moaned and grunted through tears to slip it over his burned arm. Once the belt was tightly fashioned about the waist, Kevin stepped back to look at him. The sight was ridiculous. The uniform was not only far too loose fitting but also too short at the sleeves. A sliding noise rose from the darkness of the room and both boys leapt back, hearts pounding. The propped up body had toppled to the floor and a muttering groan sounded from its head. Kevin breathed deeply. Suddenly, he remembered the coin and searched about the cell. He saw it near the unconscious man. Horst noticed it as well, making eye contact with Kevin and leaning in the coins direction. Kevin lunged for it, scooping it up, resting against the wall and keeping his gaze on Horst. He breathed deep ragged breaths for the pain in his right arm.

“It’s mine.”

Horst nodded, “Can’t be said you didn’t earn it.” He looked down at the belt, jangling the manacles absently, "If you're supposed to be my prisoner, I should be putting these on you."

"No. We can make it look good without those."

"Anyone took a close look at us and noticed you not in irons, we're done for." Horst's brow arched in a way that made Kevin uncomfortable.

He paused for a moment, pushing the coin into the folds of the shirt about his arm, "Fine but I'm keeping the key."

Horst's lips pursed, then he nodded, "Fair's fair."

A low and gravelly voice called from the corridor, the two boys heads span around, “Hey! You birds going to mess about in there all night, or are you gonna let us go?”

A chorus of agreement rang from a dozen cells. 

Kevin stood carefully, debating his options as he met two glowing eyes between bars at the door across from the Horst’s cell, “Sorry, guys. We can’t all pretend to be prisoners of one guy. We’d all just end up right back in here anyway.”

“You ain’t fooling no one with little Horst looking like that. You really want out? A jailbreak’s the way to go.”

Kevin’s head bobbed up and down, less nodding than contemplating.

"We ain't got all night."

Horst turned quickly, "He's right, come on. You get him, I'll get the next one."

Kevin walked slowly out of the cell and across the corridor, "Okay." He placed his left hand under the wooden bar to the cell. 

A prisoner further down pushed his face into the bars, "Hey, moor, you got any more of those coins?"

Looking up, Kevin found the glowing eyes smiling at him. He took a step back. An arm shot from the bars in front of him. He shot back, falling half way into Horst's cell, "Horst! Don't!"

Horst's hand was lifting the bar when his head shot back to Kevin.

"Let us out, Horst. Let us out now."

Horst turned to the fingers wringing the bars in front of him.

"Don't do it, Horst."

"Little Horst, what's the legerdemain going to say when he finds you left us locked up?"

"Horst!" Kevin held out his hand, watching Horst's grip tighten on the wooden bar, "Horst!"

The metal helmed boy turned to him again.

Kevin fixed his eyes upon glinting, wavering pupils, "You can let them out and get thrown back in here, or you can get the coin. That's it."

Shouting and cursing voices flew hollow through the air, failing to penetrate the contemplative gaze held between the two boys. Horst's hand dropped from the wooden bar and he hobbled toward Kevin, holding out his hand. Both nearly fell to the ground as Kevin gripped the hand and stood. Horst took the key to the manacles off the ring on his belt and passed it to Kevin, who slipped it within the folds of the yellow cloth near the coin. It scratched and bit on his wound. Stepping before Horst, he waited as the manacles were clasped around his wrists. The right cuff squeezed the rank cloth so tightly on the burn he saw stars and ground his teeth. Breathing deeply, he began to walk toward the end of the corridor with Horst close behind. 

A shocked silence permeated the air for a moment as if the other prisoners could think of nothing to say to their betrayer. Then the one across from Horst’s cell threw his voice booming across the stone, “Prisoners are escaping! The moor’s been set free! He’s bewitched the guard! Stop them!” All the other prisoners joined in this chorus that flew through the castle walls. 

Kevin turned to find Horst looking back and forth frantically, shuffling his feet. He made eye contact with the metal helmed boy again, “Come on!”

“We should run…” The boys voice shook like a sapling in a gale.

“No, we need to walk out like we’re supposed to be here. Who’s going to believe them?”

Horst nodded slowly, taking one last look at the cells and placing a hand on Kevin’s arm.

“Hey.”

Horst’s eyes darted toward him.

“You’re in charge here. Act like it.”

Horst squared his shoulders and his face became like stone, though cracked and fit to crumble. They passed through the door and into the small room with the table which had a large bottle almost empty but for a few ounces of some unknown liquid. Once Horst closed the door the chorus of voices was less pronounced, though still loud enough to rattle the senses. Kevin was sweating profusely. He was already exhausted and had no idea how far outside the castle freedom might be. Horst had said there was a whole city out there. He began walking toward the steep stair, but turned back to find Horst draining the bottle of its remaining contents.

“What are you doing!”

Horst wiped his face and staggered, a little more confidently, toward him, “A little liquid courage never hurt no one.”

_ Do not trust him. _

Kevin spun about the room, "Did you hear that?"

Horst tensed, "What? Someone coming?"

_ Someone is coming. Do not trust the boy. _

Kevin stood straight, facing away from the metal helmed boy, "Yeah, someone's coming."

A silhouette loomed at the top of the stairs, "The feck's going on down there!"

Horst slapped a cruel grip on Kevin’s shoulder, “Not terr be concerned ‘bout! Just pris’ners in a row ‘bout this one bein’ taken off!”

Kevin hung his head and closed his eyes, praying Horst’s atrocious accent would not give them away.

The silhouette stood silent for one excruciating moment, “Who are ye? Don’t remember seeing ye before.”

“Right, name’s Parwel. Tailor’s son.”

“Ah, yeah. I remember. Where’s Sturl? He’s usually the one overseeing the dungeons.”

"Yeah, uh, ate some bad fish. Seen it m'self. Real messy stuff, like-"

"Alright, alright, don't need no more details." The silhouette stomped leather boots down the stairway toward them, almost silent in the cacophony of the prisoners. At the base of the stair he ran his eyes up and down Kevin, who felt eminently aware of his hard nipples exposed to the cold, "Where ye taking this one?"

Horst's words caught in his throat but he pushed through, hardly missing the beat, "The 'quisitor wants to have a word with 'em. Why's ye can see I'm in a hurry."

“The inquisitor's in his personal estate out in the burbs, sleeping likely. Didn’t he already meet with the moor?”

Horst sighed and raised his voice, “Listen here, that’s where I’s told to take ‘em. Don’t make the orders, just follow ‘em and I’d like not be whipped for not doin’ so in a timely manner.”

The metal helmed man held his eyes on Horst, then pulled the wooden club from his side. He turned away and stepped toward the door to the cells, slamming the club against the bars, “Pipe down in there or we’ll hang every last one of ye in the morning!” The cells fell silent and he moved to the stair, “Well, tell ye what, I’ll go with ye. It’s the end of my watch and my home’s in that direction anyway. Ye may not know, being new, but there’s always supposed to be two taking high risk prisoners anywhere and regardless of Sturl being out they’d whip you for going alone, timely manner or not.”

“I thank ye.”

When the metal helmed man was halfway up the stair, Kevin turned to Horst and motioned toward his bare torso and feet. Horst seemed not to understand. Kevin jerked his shoulders about, gesturing more vigorously with his head until Horst looked up.

“Hey! Might we get some sorta coverin’ for this’n? Don’t want no one balking at us and slowin’ us down if we gotta take ‘im across town.”

The metal helmed man did not turn back as he reached the top of the stair, “Course, I’ll grab something from processing up here. Come on.”

The two boys trudged up the stairs as quickly as their ragged bodies would carry them. The journey was strenuous, their legs struggling to push themselves upward and Kevin felt it would be impossible to avoid suspicion after this trek. He wanted to turn back to Horst and scream at him to drop his accent, but there was no way to convey this information without the other man hearing. Atop the stair sweat poured from his face and chest, pattering on the carpet below and at the same time he felt colder than he had ever been.

The metal helmed man took something from a shelf to the right and approached, “This’ll do.” He threw a gray cloak over Kevin that surrounded him down to his ankles. It was coarse and brittle, but comfortably heavy. The man pulled the hood roughly over his eyes, “Is that how ye dress yeselves in the moorlands? Running around in nothing but your undergarments?”

Kevin stared silently at the underside of the hood.

“Hey, I asked you a question.”

His knees nearly buckled as Horst’s hand landed roughly on his shoulder again, “Ain’t got time for this! Ye gonna lead or what?”

“No need to get ornery. Let’s be off.”

As they passed out of the room, Kevin watched his feet for a sense of direction. Horst, leading him by the arm, nearly drove him into the doorway, so he resolved to guide himself by the sound of the other man’s footsteps. He wanted to think, but found it impossible with the sheer focus required to keep himself moving. What was that voice? It said he shouldn’t trust Horst, but could he trust it? These thoughts and any deeper reflection drift quickly away from him with each strained step.

They passed through a small doorway in the corridor to the left. This was probably a smaller door within the massive double doors at the middle of the hall, though Kevin couldn’t be sure. He was outside now. The wind blustered against his ankles and neck. He watched the grooves of cobblestones pass by, rivulets of snow and ice passing between them. He still remembered the cold of his first night in the forest. This was cold, but nothing by comparison. Moonlight emblazoned every step and between the snowy mortar every imperfection of the muddy cobbles was made plain. Wet muck collected on his toenails that he thought couldn’t have gotten dirtier. 

_ Go left past the bridge, down Bend Alley. _

Horst’s hand squeezed roughly on his arm and he stopped. The footsteps of the man ahead drifted into the distance and voices blew on the winds in a bantering whisper. Horst walked around him, becoming a dark shadow over his body, “Yer in for it, I tell ye! One wrong move an ye won’t make it t’where we’re goin’!”

Kevin’s voice was so hushed it was barely audible to him, “Drop that stupid fucking accent, you’re going to get us caught.”

“Right lot of good that would do now. They’d wonder why I’m not speaking like a moron all of a sudden.”

“Listen, we have to go left past the bridge. Bend Alley.”

Horst shadow put its hands on its hips, “I know it. In the opposite direction, though. We’ll be suspect if I tell our fine guide that. Besides, the inquisitor’s estate is closer to the edge of the city and has less guards. Easier to get out that way.”

Kevin stared at the inside of the hood, trying to weigh his options but hardly able to conjure a clear thought, "I know what I'm doing. That's the way we need to go."

Horst blew a stifled laugh, "Know what you're doing, do you? A week ago you didn't know there was a city outside of your cell. Now you're a damned carpographer."

"Just fucking do it."

Footsteps crossed the cobblestones toward them. Kevin was thrown sideways, struck to the side of the head by an open palm, "Don't talk back t'me, moor!"

He lay on the wet cobbles, barely maintaining his consciousness, watching the two pairs of leather boots, now facing each other.

"Gett'n rowdy this'n."

"Well, don't show him too hard or we'll be carrying him to the inquisitor's. Anyhow, we've been given leave to pass. The gatemen aren't liking it, so we best go quickly."

A hand gripped under Kevin's arm and he knew it was Horst's by the way it shook violently while trying to lift him. He managed to come to a stand after several scrambling seconds. They proceeded on, Kevin's strides as weary as they had ever been. He was extremely frustrated with Horst's dedication to his role, as metal helmed boy jabbed him with a wooden club every few paces, reminding him to hurry and that ,"This here ain't no mosey in the park."

Their elevation was shifting, the cobblestones became larger and less uniform. This must be the bridge.  Water appeared before Kevin’s eyes. His feet slipped down mortar and stone and he scattered left around the gap, continuing down the bridge with more gentle steps. The pain in his body almost entirely melted away as he was consumed with fury toward Horst’s poor direction. Why was part of the bridge blown out? Why didn’t Horst bother to lead him around it? The elevation shifted again and soon there was a short break in the cobbles. The bridge had ended, and Horst was pulling him to the right. 

He tugged left with the arm Horst was holding. Horst jabbed him. He continued to tug left and continued to get jabbed until he came to a full stop and turned his head. The hood covered any view of the metal helmed boy but he hoped this would convey his message all the same. The jabs became harder and faster. His ribs were aching. Then the footsteps ahead of them ceased.

“Why are ye stopped? Come on.”

Horst’s jabbing stopped and he stood silently. Kevin held his posture, hoping Horst would make a decision soon.

Finally he called to the other man, “We gotta go left. Down Bend Alley.”

“That be in the opposite direction. We’ll take at least fifteen minutes longer that way.”

“Can’t make much sense of it m’self, but those are the orders. S’pose they probably want us to take back alleys to avoid anyone seein’ ‘im.”

The footsteps ahead began again, strafing left, “Damned Caer Lleon nobles. We ain’t spies, we’re the guard. All this cloak and dagger makes me ill.”

Horst began leading Kevin again toward the footsteps, “Couldn’t agree more. Next they’ll ask us t’sneak ‘im through a window!”

Kevin breathed a sigh of relief, though he didn’t know why. His circumstances were no less dire than thirty seconds ago. What was he supposed to do in Bend Alley?

They walked on, winding here and there so frequently that he could not tell whether they were still moving left or toward the alley. The cobblestones broke and changed direction and size several times. His feet had grown so cold they were beginning to sting, his soles turning an angry red. Sounds erupted in the dead of the night, their softness seeming a great clamor in the still air. Metal creaking, wooden shutters tapping on sills, drunken murmurs, foreign bodies shifting in the dark.

“Alright, Pawel, watch yeself. We’re nearly there. Once we reach the other side of the alley, we cut right and straight on to the inquisitor.”

The cobbles were filling with ice and snow. Broken glass and other refuse littered the sides of Kevin’s vision. At one point a limp hand drifted into and out of his line of sight. The sounds of the night had not faded entirely, but all called hollow from far away, hardly able to penetrate through this void of silence.

_ You are close. You must get away from them soon. _

How the hell was he supposed to do that?

_ I do not know how but you must. _

Kevin breathed quicker, his heart beat louder in his chest. This cold numbed none of his pain and it swelled within him now. His ribs ached. His shoulders and joints were tense and ringing. His right hand burned, a searing flame that was fuelled by the scratch of the coin and the clasp of the manacles. And he was so tired. So very very tired. He felt any movement, any attempt at escape would send him reeling to his knees. He wanted to fall to his knees, to lay down on the cobbles, softer than his cell for the cushion of the snow. The veins in his neck strained. His body heaved a single sob and he squeezed his eyes shut for a moment to cast out everything. Everything but the need to be free.

His feet shifted and his knees bent, preparing to run. He bowed his head and threw it back, the hood flying from his eyes. The thin alleyway met him, ramshackle wooden buildings, chipped and crumbling under their own weight. There was a light far ahead, beyond the metal helmed man in front of him. Then the hand at his arm vanished. Horst passed him to his right, hobbling from his own exhaustion, wooden club raised in hand. Kevin froze as the club drifted down onto the head of the metal helmed man and slid off it to bump lightly on his shoulder. The man spun around, a large dagger drawn, but stopped with eyes wide at finding Horst brandishing the weapon against him.

All three of them were still for a moment, then Horst aimed a finger at Kevin, “He’s bewitched me! Get him!” In that second, Kevin saw, grasped tightly in Horst’s fingers, the key to his manacles and the glint of the coin. 

_ Run. _

A scream bellowed from the depths of his body as he charged into Horst. His shoulder struck the metal helmed boy in the ribs and they both tumbled against a stone wall. The helm crashed against the wall and flew from Horst’s head. Kevin pulled himself from the tangle of limbs and found the coin and key resting in the snow nearby. He pushed himself wildly toward them as the man took lumbering steps in his direction, reaching with one hand, the knife raised in the other. Kevin scooped the key and coin up and pushed himself across an icy patch with his feet when the man’s eyes turned to the boy at the wall. He froze.

“Horst?” The man’s head spun to Kevin, then back to Horst, who was struggling to rise. He took a step back, then another. His head shook in some horrified contemplation, then he turned and ran down the alley as fast as his legs would take him.

Kevin realized every muscle in his body was locked and he was not breathing. He released every ounce of air in his lungs, then fumbled with the key to find the keyhole in the manacles. When his right hand was free he brought his arms in front of him, stretching his shoulders. He placed the key gently in the cloth of his right hand where his fingers were but could not apply enough pressure to release the left cuff. 

Horst was still rocking this way and that, holding his head, seemingly unable to get his bearings. Kevin moved from the patch of ice to the opposite side of the alley as Horst. He braced his left hand against the wooden wall of a building and, with great effort, stood. His feet dragged him, sliding his shoulder against the splintering, wet boards. His toes hardly lifted from the cobbled, barrelling through broken glass and snow. Horst’s haggard breathing grew ever more distant. Doorways broke along the wall and he fell past them to catch himself on the next wall and move on. The alley spun but the yellow light seemed to blaze fixed on the horizon. This is where he must go. He knew it. 

“W-wait… please, help me… They’ll find me… I don’t know what they’ll do…”

Kevin did not pause on his belabored journey across the wall, “That sucks.”

“Wait!” 

Leather gloves and boots beat against the cobbles behind him. At one moment he heard Horst’s whole body slump back to the ground in a failed attempt to stand. These noises faded in the dark as the light drew closer. It was a bold, golden light casting into the alley from some abode, scattering the darkness before it. He was just beside it now. A window blazed above him. The doorway was just beyond. He leaned against the corner of the wall to look upon the door set within, up a short flight of stairs. A handle clacked and the door swung open, blinding light swallowing the whole of his vision.


End file.
